Whoever exalts himself will be humbled…

I came to accept Christ ten years ago, when I had yet gotten into this dire circumstance as then. It was a totally unbelievable decision for once I was that self-professed Antichrist and Christianity is the last thing with which I would associate. Ask any of my friends or my family members, they would not hesitate to tell you that I would rather die than to accept God. They nearly fell off their chairs when I told them I’ve accepted Christ.

Indeed I was and to a certain extent am still a very proud man. I take pride in my intellect. Steeped in the art of rhetoric and logic, I could easily outargue, outtalk and outwit my most brilliant of religious opponents, and taking much delights in luring them into a logically irreconcilable quicksand. For some reasons, it pleased me tremendously to see that I’m ultimately proven right and they’re absolutely wrong. So much pride I’ve about myself that the only creed in my life was none other than that Man’s the measure of all things, of what he is, he is; of what he’s not, he’s not.

Reason became my God; Sextus Empiricus’s Pyrrhonism my bible; David Hume and Frederick Nietzsche my greatest prophets.

Towards religions or religious beliefs, I had nothing but scorns towards them. Quoting Karl Marx, these beliefs are nothing more than opium of the masses. Those were the days when I lived my life, went about my days and arranged my thoughts according to the motto of David Hume:

“If we take in our hand any volume of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance, let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames, for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion.”

Yet, there was something out there about God and religion still lingered in my mind, like a splinter in my brain which I could not rid nor I understand why.

Nothing best describes my feeling at that point than the way Blaise Pascal, mathematician and philosopher, describes it: “The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing.”

I continued my atheistic way until I found myself at a crossroad of my life. An important decision had to be made about my life and fast. I wasn’t getting young, my career was going no way and I had yet to settle down with a family, any mistake would cost me dearly.

To that point in my life, I had nothing but contempt for Christianity, never allowed myself anywhere near the Bible, let alone to read it, except for certain passages taken out of context merely to corroborate my anti-religion arguments. The bible as well as Christians were always kept at a pole vault’s length.

I remembered I went to a Church service one day, after much pestering from a lady friend of mine. She belongs to a Christian group which she called Charismatic. I went, I saw, I was nearly convulsed with amusement.

The preachers and believers jumped even higher and wailed even louder than the Chinese Shamans I have seen. Everyone, except me of course, was screaming, moaning in mumbo jumbo, beating their chests, flinging their arms wildly, in a bid to outdo each other in this berserk profusion. It was SPOOKY yet funny. My lady friend, apparently after returning to mother-earth, explained to me those “sacred” acts as “speaking in tongues” and “possession by the holy spirit”.

“Oh, I see,” I said nonchalantly. “You mean like those Chinese Shamans practising spirit mediumship.”

She seemed offended. Quickly, she opened her bible, chanted a couple of verses to me, and offered to pray for my forgiveness (presumably for uttering such profane remarks).
For some reasons, I had always been a cynics when it comes to religious matter. I not only disliked but would be offended if anyone makes an exaggerated show of holiness or moral superiority. And I could be very brunt about it.

However, after arriving at that crossroad of my life, my “God” — reason — finally failed me. I sought an answer from her, but only silence was heard, bringing me much more exasperation and anguish. When “reason” failed, I sought out alternatives which I so much abhorred and disdained previously: fortune telling, astrology and other New Age ideas. I could not believe myself that I would end up being a sucker for such trash.

Finally, I reluctantly took the advice of a well-intention friend to at least take a peek at the bible. “Alright! I’ll just give it a try” I told him.

And I did.